Words and Thoughts of Joshua Scott Witsaman

Tag Archives: publishing

So I’ve written a novel. That sounds pretty good. Sure. That’s a great deal of time and effort put into 230,000 some words of story telling. I’ve read, and re-read the pages several times, changing, editing, adding as I need to. Now however I am on the brink of the truly difficult part, figuring out what to do with it next. I have done some research online about a few different literary agents, but of course there is also a great deal of spotlight these days on self publishing and e-books and all that. There are other resources available as well such as creating an audio book on a pod cast and circulating the work that way. Here is an example of that: PodioBooks.com

Frankly I’m leaning toward the agent route. It’s the traditionally best approach to take, most agents are also editors, which I think should go over the work with a fine toothed comb, and it just seems to make sense for me. I don’t have the resources, or connections to promote myself enough to do a self-published e-book and I don’t really have the time to create an audio book that might never be heard. I’d like to be able to get started on my next project while this one is in the hands of some professionals somewhere.

Now my biggest problem is that my current story has only been read completely by one other person, a friend, who had great things to say about it and a few helpful suggestions. I have another friend about half way through reading it, she’s actually doing some illustrations for me so she is taking her time and sketching and taking notes as she reads so it will be a little longer until she is through it all. My wife is a middle school teacher who is always under various time constraints. Although she is the best editor and literary critic I know, the last thing she wants to do with her free time during the school year is edit my work, essentially an extension of her work life, and I can’t blame her. I want her above all others to take a look at the writing, because I know she will tell it to me like it is, and let me know what’s good and what isn’t. She will get to it when she can, she is currently swamped with educating America’s future. I however am anxious to put things in motion! I have everything in place for submitting my work to an agent, cover letter, summary, chapter outline, finely tuned writing example, author bio, the works! All ready to print out and send in.

Oh and don’t get me started on printing things out, I thought it would be so much easier to just print it from home, I’d buy a brand new ink cartridge, a ream of paper, and I would be good to go. To make a long story short just go to kinkos or wherever and print your work out there. Cough up the $40 and make it easy on yourself. Trust me something will go wrong at home, and it will infuriate you AND it will all wind up costing more money in the long run.

The devil's tool

Anywho printing concerns aside, I feel stuck. I eagerly want to send this thing out there and get the whole process in motion, I want to do something more with this work I have done. While on the other hand, I am self-conscious and desperately seek some more test audiences for this thing, a bit more validation that it might actually be worth publishing, which I of course believe it is. Everyone is too busy, or unwilling to read it off a computer screen (which I don’t blame them) and I don’t have enough printed copies to go around. I’m very paranoid about handing it over to random people I don’t know and I really just want it into the hands of some pros who know more about the publishing industry then I do! Oh well, I’m sure I’ll figure something out.